Plasmodesmata and plant viruses. A centenary story

The passage of plant viruses from a cell to adjacent ones remained for a long time an unexplained event. Only during the thirties did Samuel and other plant virologists put forward the hypothesis that the passage occurred through plasmodesmata, i.e. those protoplasmic connections between plant cells described since the late 19th century. A direct relation between viruses and plasmodesmata was first demonstrated by electron microscopy during the late 1960s by Esau and co-workers, and then widely confirmed. The mechanism of the passage was investigated in depth starting from the 1970s, and research received a remarkable impulse after that a well-defined model of plasmodesmata had been obtained thank, in particular, to work of the Robards' and Gunning's groups. In this context, the discovery of the polycystronic functionality of the viral genomes was fundamental. A protein coded by tobacco mosaic virus, discovered in 1982 independently by the Soviet group of Atabekov and the American group of Zaitlin, was demonstrated to be indispensable for the transport of virus infection from cell to cell through plasmodesmata. Elegant investigations on this 'movement protein' demonstrated that it actually increases the permeability of plasmodesmata. The relation between viruses and plasmodesmata is one of the most interesting and investigated theme of research, which is receiving much attention from plant virologists, physiologists and molecular biologists. The current status of knowledge still presents unsolved questions, and the story is far from over.